I'm 15 and about the only person at my school into model railroading as far as I can tell, lol.
Sawyer Berry
Clemson University c/o 2018
Building a protolanced industrial park layout
37 for me. Our club : a few HS members. A few members in their late 30s. 1 or 2 in thier 40s. Most 60+ with a few in the 70s and 2 in their mid 80s. "younger" folks bring in DCC/computer/electronics expertise. "Older" folks tend to use club time to chat with the guys.....
Im 20 and have been in the hobby since I was 12. I've came a long way from a Life-Like oval of track in the floor to a 4X8 and now to a 20X20 layout room. I was the only Modeler in high school and I have yet to meet one in college either.
alocoI'm 48. I'm too young to model the steam era and too old to appreciate low nose diesels.
I'm 48. I'm too young to model the steam era and too old to appreciate low nose diesels.
Man are you old. I can't imagine being 48. So, do you remember watching the vietnam war on TV? or the first man to walk on the moon in 1969 on a black and white TV? Or playing with matchbox cars (the good ones made from BEFORE 1969)? yea, well if I was 48 I'd probably remember that stuff too.
I'm 54 and proud to say I still play with trains. Some of my fondest memories as a child were going to the basement with Grandpa, where he had a Lionel O-27 set up on a table or desk. I built my first layout , a 4 x 8, around age 10 or 11 with Lionel HO, which was probably a disaster and we won't get into that here. I've taken a couple of breaks from the hobby (teens - girls, cars, suds) and later in my 30's, when I worked and went to SIU full time. As soon as I finished graduate school however, I was back at work on a 10 x 12' layout in the back room of an old farm house we rented. We've since bought our own property, and I am in the process of trying to plan a layout, possibly part of it a double deck, around the basement walls.
Well, I kinda know why you want to find people your own age or at least close. Until they get to know you some of the folks and the people at the LHS think of you as young and only worth a glance quite often. Not everywhere, but it's out there. I've seen it. Good thing about the forums is age don't mean doodly squat. Shoot some of us adults act more like kids than they do.LOL. Anyway, hang in there. Pretty soon people your age will grow up and admit they like trains too.
I'm forty seven and feeling like a teenager. Ow! My back.
Todd
Central Illinoyz
In order to keep my position as Master and Supreme Ruler of the House, I don't argue with my wife.
I'm a small town boy. A product of two people from even smaller towns. I don’t talk on topic….. I just talk.
DrilineMan are you old. I can't imagine being 48. So, do you remember watching the vietnam war on TV? or the first man to walk on the moon in 1969 on a black and white TV? Or playing with matchbox cars (the good ones made from BEFORE 1969)?
Dr. Frankendiesel aka Scott Running BearSpace Mouse for president!15 year veteran fire fighterCollector of Apple //e'sRunning Bear EnterprisesHistory Channel Club life member.beatus homo qui invenit sapientiam
I'm 19, gonna be 20 in a couple months. I have to agree with most of the other young people on the forum that there are relatively few people that are into trains (though I am surprised at the number of guys in their early 20s). I was the only one as far as I knew in high school and am the only one I have discovered so far in college. Being in college I dont really have time for trains 8 months out of the year anyway. When I am home and I have free time I have friends competing with trains for my time. Meh, no real plans on building a layout beyond my test track until I figure out what my post college plans are.
TMarsh Shoot some of us adults act more like kids than they do.LOL. I'm forty seven and feeling like a teenager. Ow! My back.
Shoot some of us adults act more like kids than they do.LOL.
I'm pretty sure that's the meaning of 'crazy old coot'. I'm a young 41yo. Too young for medicare but old enough to remember life before the techno age, and it was much more simple. Believe it or not, there was a time with no DCC, no cell phones, a 27" tv was huge, cassette tapes and vinyl were in, my home computer was a commodore vic 20, atari 2600 was a top toy for Christmas, there were only 2 different ketchups on the store shelves, McDonalds was not a bad name, and they were trying a new product called chicken McNuggets. Golly have the times changed.
...graduated from Penn State 35 pounds ago.
...considering placing "HSG" on my business card = "High School Graduate."
Conemaugh Road & Traction circa 1956
Old enough to know better, young enough to remember how.
I have not quite hit the half-century mark, but I have 3 boys who make me feel much older. I am 7.5 times the age of the youngest railroader in the house.
As a wise man once said, "We don't stop playing because we grow old, we grow old because we stop playing." (George Bernard Shaw).
Connecticut Valley Railroad A Branch of the New York, New Haven, and Hartford
"If you think you can do a thing or think you can't do a thing, you're right." -- Henry Ford
33 with a wife and son. The son restarted the interest in trains.
I'm 15, but I'll be 16 in June (which means I get my permit! ).
I know no one my age into trains. None in my school (so that means that 1/500 of my school likes trains), at least that I know of, and I'm pretty sure.
My Model Railroad: Tri State RailMy Photos on Flickr: FlickrMy Videos on Youtube: YoutubeMy Photos on RRPA: RR Picture Archives
Well I am 62 and now that I am retired I have the time for building a model railroad. I have been interested since my first American Flyer 4x8 layout with the 1x3 sides which were painted bright green enamel. Ah yes, memories....
There's never time to do it right, but always time to do it over.....
I'm 52.
It appears that there is a fairly common pattern to model railroaders' ages: There is a bunch in the teen to early 20s group, then another bunch in the mid-forties and older group. This actually follows my own "career" with the hobby and I think it's pretty common: I got started in model railroading as a teen, then left the hobby in my 20s and 30s to pursue my career and do the family thing, then I started again in my mid-forties (using a variation on my "teen era" track plan). My guess is that many of us follow that pattern, or we get started by"helping" one of our kids and end up getting hooked ourselves in our early-mid 40s.
Of course, there are exceptions, but I hypothesize that these are common patterns.
As a teen I was frustrated that there weren't more of us in the hobby, and that the non-train-fan kids were not very nice about my hobby. Generally I kept quiet about it, and that made it even harder to find other "train guys". Frankly, I wish the model railroading demographic were more evenly populated both age-wise and gender-wise (wouldn't it be fun to have more women in the hobby?), but it is what it is - we don't intentionally discourage folks of certain ages or gender; the hobby just doesn't fit them, is my guess.
Now that I'm an old timer I find it interesting how many people I find who are also in the hobby and are happy to talk about it (many of them were "closet" model railroaders as teens, too). I also find the non-model railroaders still don't "get it," but at least they are nice about it.
Phil, I'm not a rocket scientist; they are my students.
I'm only 68 shooting for 69 next month.
Retired at 53. What is it they say?
Dream..... Plan..... Build.....?
Maybe after another glass.
Brent
"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."
BamaCSX83I'm 26, I had a plywood empire (read 4x8 double oval) consisting from my dad's Tyco and my LifeLike trainsets. From there I graduated up to building Athearn BB's and some Walthers kits. Put all the trains away when I hit driving age. Just got back into the hobby almost 3 years ago with the birth of my first daughter. She's a train nut just like her daddy and its something that a) allows me to spend time with her doing something other than tea parties and such, b) is something that I enjoyed as a kid and always challenged me as a modeller (built model cars/ships/planes, still do), and c) its something that I can always work on slowly, its one of the few hobbies that as everyone on here has said, you can always work on it. I'm planning a large double deck layout modelling the tracks that run through my local area, the setting is "today" (within the last 5 years), and while I don't have the first stick of track laid yet, I do have a plan and my list of givens and druthers. Heck, it may take 20 years to build it, but I'm going to build it!
That sounds a lot like me. Loved trains too much up until my junior year in highschool. Had the 4X8 running the Blueboxes and Walther's kits. Moved back to San Diego, got a truck and a surfboard and the trains stayed in boxes. It wasn't until I was around 26 and my son on the way when I found out about a local HO club. Next thing I knew I was hooked again and have been going nuts ever since. Two sons later and a wife that can't figure out where there love of trains came from. Now I too am planning for a layout to call my own.
I'm now 33 and I am very thankful that I have a lot of time ahead of me for model railroading with my two young boys by my side. Heck give the wife a controller!
--Zak Gardner
My Layout Blog: http://mrl369dude.blogspot.com
http://zgardner18.rrpicturearchives.net
VIEW SLIDE SHOW: CLICK ON PHOTO BELOW
BATMAN Retired at 53. What is it they say? Dream..... Plan..... Build.....? Maybe after another glass. Brent
Brent,
I am so jealous of you right now. NOT because you say you are retired but that you have a golden retriever that looks just like the one I grew up with. Waiting a little longer and then I'll be getting my puppy soon.
As I stated earlier in this thread, model railroaders don´t age.
I am turning 54 pretty soon, and I am crazy about "trains" since I was given my first train set 47 years ago. With the exception of a longer pause (in fact, too long a pause) during my university days and the first steps into work life, model railrading has accompanied me ever since, however with some changes of directions.
I am fortunate, that model railroading enjoys a much greater social acceptance at this side of the Big Pond, maybe because trains are a lot more apparent in our every day life.
64
... and still playing with trains
I call it operation
Wolfgang
Pueblo & Salt Lake RR
Come to us http://www.westportterminal.de my videos my blog
70
I have been off and on since I was 12.
Been at it steadily for the past 30 years.
Roger Hensley= ECI Railroad - http://madisonrails.railfan.net/eci/eci_new.html == Railroads of Madison County - http://madisonrails.railfan.net/ =
shayfan84325 I'm 52. It appears that there is a fairly common pattern to model railroaders' ages: There is a bunch in the teen to early 20s group, then another bunch in the mid-forties and older group. This actually follows my own "career" with the hobby and I think it's pretty common: I got started in model railroading as a teen, then left the hobby in my 20s and 30s to pursue my career and do the family thing, then I started again in my mid-forties (using a variation on my "teen era" track plan). My guess is that many of us follow that pattern, or we get started by"helping" one of our kids and end up getting hooked ourselves in our early-mid 40s.Of course, there are exceptions, but I hypothesize that these are common patterns.As a teen I was frustrated that there weren't more of us in the hobby, and that the non-train-fan kids were not very nice about my hobby. Generally I kept quiet about it, and that made it even harder to find other "train guys". Frankly, I wish the model railroading demographic were more evenly populated both age-wise and gender-wise (wouldn't it be fun to have more women in the hobby?), but it is what it is - we don't intentionally discourage folks of certain ages or gender; the hobby just doesn't fit them, is my guess.Now that I'm an old timer I find it interesting how many people I find who are also in the hobby and are happy to talk about it (many of them were "closet" model railroaders as teens, too). I also find the non-model railroaders still don't "get it," but at least they are nice about it.
My dad is old enough to kill me if I gave his age, so I will simply say this: He told me stories about when he was a kid, he had an HO scale layout on a 4X8, and he would strap firecrackers to the bottom of his cars with silly putty. Needless to say, KaBOOM would ensue. When I came around, he got back into trains because I was fanatic for them. He still has a lot to learn about trains, but I think that should go by layout No. 2 (assuming I can do so at college according to the current plans). Anyway, to the point, do you guys think this follows Shayfans analysis? Do you think my dad will be joining our ranks when my sister and I grow up? Assuming I wasnt born, would he ever join our ranks? What do you think...
~G4
19 Years old, modeling the Cowlitz, Chehalis, and Cascade Railroad of Western Washington in 1927 in 6X6 feet.
zgardner18 BATMAN Retired at 53. What is it they say? Dream..... Plan..... Build.....? Maybe after another glass. Brent Brent, I am so jealous of you right now. NOT because you say you are retired but that you have a golden retriever that looks just like the one I grew up with. Waiting a little longer and then I'll be getting my puppy soon.
Actually this girl on my lap was two days away from having eight puppies. We have six Goldens. If you want to see more just Google "" and my wifes webpage is usually at the top of the page.
IVRWDo you think my dad will be joining our ranks when my sister and I grow up? Assuming I wasnt born, would he ever join our ranks? What do you think...
Do you think my dad will be joining our ranks when my sister and I grow up? Assuming I wasnt born, would he ever join our ranks? What do you think...
... it´s in the genes, IVRW, it´s in the genes!
Maybe when your father has put you and your sis through college, he will come back to this great hobby. Actually, it was my father who got me started. He had some trains (Marklin, early HO scale of 1934 - imagine the value today) as a young boy, but due to the war, and the bad times that followed, he was never able to build a layout of his own. He fostered my interest, though, and is still an avid reader of the TRAINS magazine - at the age of 84.
OK I was bored. 47 people have listed there age, average is 36.6 years old. Age groups
10-19 7
20-29 8
30-39 4
40-49 7
50-59 11
60 plus 10.
If you said you are all most say 30, I used age 29.
Maybe Walther's should advertise in the AARP magazine.
I hate Rust
Modeling the fictional B&M Dowe, NH branch in the early 50's.